OK, think of it this way: A poor person gets government benefits. He’d be a fool to part with his vote for less than the amount of the benefits he gets. He has to assume that a rich person is buying his vote in order to pay lower taxes and deprive the poor of their benefits. So it makes sense for the poor to either vote or demand a price for their vote commensurate with the benefits they currently receive.
That said, immediate need may trump rational calculation, as, indeed may a sheer emotional response. So again, no good for things like national elections (probably; though not as bad as it initially sounds). But the question remains: in what type of environment would this work best? I’m thinking resource allocation among peers (e.g. investment groups or corporate bodies) but would love to hear additional takes.
He’d be a fool to part with his vote for less than the amount of the benefits he gets.
Doesn’t seem right. Even assuming the person buying his vote wants to use it to remove his benefits, that one vote is unlikely to be the difference between the vote-buyer’s candidate winning and losing. The expected effect of the vote on the benefits is going to be much less than the size of the benefits.
The reasoning would hold if people reasoned as if they were deciding for their entire class, but not if they believe they’re deciding for just themselves. Unfortunately, the religious principle of deciding as if one is deciding for one’s entire agent-class (FDT) is not exactly ubiquitous.
Well, the entire class is receiving a much larger benefit than any member of the class, so the class as a whole would sell it’s votes for that amount. An individual voter would have to make choices based on the benefits they receive. If I stand to lose $1k by selling my vote, I’m not going to sell it for less than $1k. That said, I’m not guaranteed to lose the whole $1k or in fact any of it, so there is a “probability discount”. Maybe the floor isn’t the exact amount of benefits but some percentage of it. Looks like I have another question :D.
If there are a hundred thousand people like you who are being asked to sell your vote and you stand to lose $1000 from the wrong person being elected, your vote can only be 1/100000 of the reason the person is elected, so you should sell it for $1000/100000 = 1 cent. Under the proper decision theory, you shouldn’t sell it for less than $1000, but the number of people in the real world who understand (let alone both understand and agree with) such decision theories is negligible on the scale of voting.
All of which goes back to my point: even if we know the benefits received, we can’t know in advance how much a vote would go for. It’s a missing piece of information from standard democracy that can only be obtained empirically.
Again, I know this will never happen at the level of politics, so this entire discussion is purely academic. What I’m more interested in is how this plays out under closer to ideal conditions (smallish group with similar resources and similar smarts).
OK, think of it this way: A poor person gets government benefits. He’d be a fool to part with his vote for less than the amount of the benefits he gets. He has to assume that a rich person is buying his vote in order to pay lower taxes and deprive the poor of their benefits. So it makes sense for the poor to either vote or demand a price for their vote commensurate with the benefits they currently receive.
That said, immediate need may trump rational calculation, as, indeed may a sheer emotional response. So again, no good for things like national elections (probably; though not as bad as it initially sounds). But the question remains: in what type of environment would this work best? I’m thinking resource allocation among peers (e.g. investment groups or corporate bodies) but would love to hear additional takes.
Doesn’t seem right. Even assuming the person buying his vote wants to use it to remove his benefits, that one vote is unlikely to be the difference between the vote-buyer’s candidate winning and losing. The expected effect of the vote on the benefits is going to be much less than the size of the benefits.
The reasoning would hold if people reasoned as if they were deciding for their entire class, but not if they believe they’re deciding for just themselves. Unfortunately, the religious principle of deciding as if one is deciding for one’s entire agent-class (FDT) is not exactly ubiquitous.
Well, the entire class is receiving a much larger benefit than any member of the class, so the class as a whole would sell it’s votes for that amount. An individual voter would have to make choices based on the benefits they receive. If I stand to lose $1k by selling my vote, I’m not going to sell it for less than $1k. That said, I’m not guaranteed to lose the whole $1k or in fact any of it, so there is a “probability discount”. Maybe the floor isn’t the exact amount of benefits but some percentage of it. Looks like I have another question :D.
If there are a hundred thousand people like you who are being asked to sell your vote and you stand to lose $1000 from the wrong person being elected, your vote can only be 1/100000 of the reason the person is elected, so you should sell it for $1000/100000 = 1 cent. Under the proper decision theory, you shouldn’t sell it for less than $1000, but the number of people in the real world who understand (let alone both understand and agree with) such decision theories is negligible on the scale of voting.
All of which goes back to my point: even if we know the benefits received, we can’t know in advance how much a vote would go for. It’s a missing piece of information from standard democracy that can only be obtained empirically.
Again, I know this will never happen at the level of politics, so this entire discussion is purely academic. What I’m more interested in is how this plays out under closer to ideal conditions (smallish group with similar resources and similar smarts).